War Horse

What we are seeing lately with critics as much as audiences in 2011 is a kind of rebelling of safe entertainment. If released any other year Steven Spielberg's sappy, patriotic War Horse would be a shoo-in for Best Picture and make more than its fair share of money at the American Box Office. And so the story goes that the reviews were split for Spielberg's WW2 horse epic and its Box Office .. meh. I wouldn't call War Horse a bad film -far from it- its ambitiously epic and lush structure did wonders on me, even when some of its episodic nature could have been trimmed - I didn't need the maudlin story of the French Grandpa and his talkative Granddaughter. Nevertheless Spielberg hasn't lost his chops for great storytelling, he is a visionary and judging by the great movies he has released the last decade -Minority Report, AI, Munich - he hasn't lost much of his famous touch. There's a scene near the end of the film where our beloved Horse runs wild through WW2 wire ravaged fields. It's a horrific scene that hints at darkness and makes you feel the Horses pain as the wires skim through his skin. However, War Horse doesn't belong in the list of great Spielberg's because it feels too familiar, almost too facile an exercise. It feels like a movie that could have won the Oscar 15-20 years ago, yet the times are changing and the way we see movies even more so. Welcome to the new decade of cinema. 2011's best movies were not easily suckered into formula, we are seeing a kind of revolution happening - Terrence Malick's The Tree Of Life and Nicolas Winding Refn's Drive are perfect examples of the new language being created. Spielberg is still stuck in his glory era, which is not to say it's a bad thing but more to say that he hasn't adapted to the times. War Horse is not a risk-taking film and the lack of Awards attention towards it shows just how far we've come and how reward now comes with a price- originality.